


The Best of Bad Plans

by Para



Series: Bad Plans [1]
Category: Girl Genius
Genre: Fluff, Gen, and jäger antics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-19
Updated: 2015-11-16
Packaged: 2018-04-27 03:45:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5032489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Para/pseuds/Para
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barry has only been trying to take care of Agatha for a week, and it's already obvious he can't protect her by himself, much less protect her and hunt the Other's remaining resources.</p><p>Handing a three year old over to a pack of jägers is probably still a terrible idea, but at least he knows she'll survive.  Even if the rest of Europa doesn't.</p><p>(Somehow it's mostly fluff.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lilithqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilithqueen/gifts).



> This will hopefully get some chapters posted in order to set up, but will probably devolve into anachronistic order after that. It's also taking second priority to Mercy For The Evil, so I make no promises on the frequency of posting. But it amuses me to no end, so it should get additional chapters relatively soon.
> 
> Dimo... might possibly have never been in the same room as a child before this. And Barry I know you are probably worried and sleep deprived on top of being in mourning and have pretty good reason to think of them as murderous monsters but _stop thinking mean things about the jägers you jerk._
> 
> As for the OC Ionel, my headcanon is that he was originally part of the boys + Jenka group, but died prior to canon. It _was_ a suicide mission, after all.
> 
> (lilithqueen, the existence of this fic is 100% your fault and I am sure you are just as sorry as Maxim is for the chocolate quest.)

“What are you doing here?”

There were four jägers, all of which looked vaguely familiar to Barry in that way of people whom he’d always seen around town, but never actually met. He couldn’t recall any of their names, if he’d ever learned them. He probably hadn’t; Bill had been obligated to deal with the jägers fairly often as the heir and then Lord Heterodyne, but Barry hadn’t, and had never felt bad enough about leaving Bill to deal with them by himself for it to win over the temptation of some free time in a lab and not having to listen to jägers. It wasn’t like Bill was in any danger, after all; the jägers would never hurt him. They just all really wanted to kill everyone _else_.

Of course, while not the heir (not then, anyway, but now, don’t think about now), Barry was still a Heterodyne, so it wasn’t surprising that all four deflated from ecstatic to vaguely hurt at his tone. Slightly irritating, but not surprising. More important was how the furry green one’s eyes had landed on the back of Agatha’s head, so Barry repeated himself. “What are you doing here?”

“Lookink for hyu.” The orange jäger had vertical horns most of a quarter meter tall, and angular, elongated arms and legs; the effect was disturbingly reminiscent of both revenants and devils. Except for the expression; the expression was that of an uncertain puppy. It still irritated Barry when they did that; jägers didn’t deserve sympathy. “And Master Bill, ov cawse.”

Sympathy wasn’t the important thing, though. “Why here? Did Klaus tell you why he sent you here?” Barry could almost certainly get away now; whatever else the jägers would do they probably wouldn’t be willing to hurt him or Agatha, if he told them who she was. But he definitely didn’t want to tell them that, and if they got word back to Klaus about where Barry was he’d be in far more trouble. And killing jägers wasn’t especially easy; three of them could easily delay Barry while the fourth ran with news. Not that it would matter if Klaus had sent them here because someone recognized Barry, but there was the chance that it was just a lucky guess. Klaus would know better than to send jägers if he was trying to pretend to still be Barry’s friend, but four jägers was also a rather poor choice to actually capture or kill Barry. They were probably scouts; the question was how close the army was, and if the jägers had been sent here with information or by luck.

The four traded what looked like startled and confused glances. The green one answered—apparently he was the leader. Barry made note of that in case this did become a fight; jäger leader almost certainly meant best fighter. “He dun send os here. Ve iz vild.”

—huh.

Wild—“Meaning you don’t work for Klaus?” All four nodded.

Well. Huh. _That_ was unexpected. Agatha stirred in her sleep, and Barry moved his hand to block the view of her a little more. “So why are you here? Why aren’t you working for Klaus?”

“Ve is lookink for hyu,” the green jäger repeated. “Ve dint think he vould.”

“Then why did any jägers join him?”

The confused and hopeful expressions turned frustrated, angry, and in the purple jäger’s case, a bit guilty. It was still the green one that answered. “He vanted Mechanicsburg, and he vanted it veak. Ve couldn’t protect it from his army vitout der Kestle, so ve joined him, and de Generals said dot de vuns dot din join him run avay.”

That… actually put the jägers in a _far_ better light. Still pitiless murdering raiders, of course, but compared to pitiless murdering raiders that cheerfully worked for the Other, that sounded less bad than it always had. “And what was the plan for the ones that didn’t join?”

“Vander.” The purple (and surprisingly well-dressed) jäger shrugged. “See vhere ve vound op, and keep goink az long az ve could.”

“I thought jägers didn’t survive on your own.”

“Yah, but we don’t die dot qvickly,” the purple one said. “Some ov us vould outliff hyu, probably.”

That the jägers were loyal enough to die for the Heterodynes wasn’t so much common knowledge in Mechanicsburg as so widely and thoroughly known that Barry couldn’t actually remember anyone bothering to say it. He still hadn’t quite expected this; dying in battle was one thing, this was something wholly different.

But useful. Barry didn’t like the jägers—they were still monsters of the old Heterodynes. But they were loyal monsters, even more so than he’d thought, and he had a Heterodyne to protect. And the Heterodyne Boys had had more than a few adventures that demonstrated the best way to beat a bad enough enemy was to be as scary as you could yourself. Barry still wasn’t used to thinking of either Lucrezia or Klaus as bad enough to justify jägers, but the Other was.

He took a breath and straightened before continuing, though it probably wasn’t necessary. “Sit.” The jägers did, hitting the ground with audible and near-simultaneous thumps. Barry sat too, more carefully. “Bill is dead.” The jägers winced; looked unhappy, but unsurprised. Barry moved his hand out of the way and turned Agatha so the jägers could see her face. She blinked awake, and mumbled something Barry couldn’t hear, wouldn’t have understood anyway. “This is Bill’s daughter. Her name is Agatha.”

It really was unfair how the jägers’ faces lit up. Then again Barry was a Heterodyne using jägers now, so he didn’t have half as much room to talk as he had five minutes ago. He set Agatha down in his lap and she stared quietly, regarding the jägers with plenty of curiosity.

And, Barry reminded himself, it was useful. Good, in a particularly limited way. He’d only gotten Agatha away from the geisterdamen a week ago, and there had already been two close calls. He couldn’t protect her, and he definitely couldn’t finish destroying the Other while protecting her. Giving her to the jägers would be a terrible idea in any other situation, but there were very few lengths they wouldn’t go to to keep her safe. With Mechanicsburg taken, they were the best option. (Even if it was only because the other options were terrible ones.)

“Have you seen geisterdamen?” The orange jäger nodded; the other three shook their heads. Well, the orange one could tell the others. “Lucrezia was the Other, and the geisterdamen work for her. She’s dead, but she was planning to take over Agatha when she grew up, and take over Mechanicsburg and the castle through her.” And the jägers, of course, but they were part of Mechanicsburg. They seemed to have figured it out too; the orange jäger was growling. It wasn’t loud enough to drown Barry out (and, quite frankly, he agreed), so he ignored it.

“I destroyed the machine she’d built for it, but machines can be rebuilt. I am going to leave Agatha with you. You will keep her safe, and if you see any geisterdamen you will kill them. You will _also_ ,” he fixed them with a slight glare, in case they were distracted by the idea of guarding a Heterodyne and killing things, “keep her away from Mechanicsburg, and away from anywhere else that might bring her within Klaus’s notice.” They didn’t look happy at that, but to Barry’s surprise, they didn’t argue or look rebellious either. “And if _any_ of you _ever_ try to give her the idea that raiding people is acceptable, I will be _extremely unhappy_.”

The jägers at least had the grace not to pretend innocence, though Barry wasn’t entirely satisfied with the green jäger’s promise that “ve won’t try to teach her dot.” He hardly had another choice, though. Except—hm.

“I am going to work on destroying what’s left of the Other’s support and resources. I will also try to send Punch and Judy to you to help raise Agatha. Trust no one else. Not even Agatha, for now; she was raised by the geisterdamen, so she’ll probably try to go to them if she gets the chance. She only knows a few words of Romanian, so don’t expect her to understand you.” There were so many more things—Agatha was fascinated by bread and adored sweets, Barry still couldn’t understand what had happened to change Klaus and Lucrezia so much, the entire continent was falling apart and he didn’t know how to stop it—but they wouldn’t help. “Any questions?”

There was, of course, a question. It came from the human-colored jäger with a ram’s horn, and was not even close to the ones Barry was expecting. “Hyu vant os to tell de odders not to vork for de Baron?”

“I don’t want anyone working for Klaus right now.” Not as long as he was conquering the continent. “But I don’t see how they could stop without him destroying Mechanicsburg and knowing I’m still around.”

“De plan vos dot if ennyvun got too injured dey vould chust go to Mamma Gkika’s, qviet-like,” the orange jäger answered. “Sum haff already, und de Baron haz not done ennyting. Dey could do dot, bot ven dey is not as hurt.”

“That…” could work, actually. So long as the jägers didn’t exaggerate _too_ much, it wouldn’t be hard for anyone to believe that they were a little more permanently damaged than they were. The amount of damage a jäger could take was truly absurd; it would probably be easier for people to believe that a badly injured jäger had died or been crippled than that they could heal. Which probably wasn’t something the jäger had really thought through, he probably hadn’t thought beyond a few jägers blending in with the others, but it was nonetheless impressive reasoning, considering the source. “That will work. As long as you make _absolutely_ sure that no one who isn’t a jäger hears about it and that only a few leave at a time, yes. That’s a good plan, you can do that.”

They were nodding, with varying degrees of energy. “Ve ken be verra quiet,” the orange jäger said. The green one gave him a doubtful look.

“…Don’t go out of your way to tell them,” Barry said. “Just if you run into one of them anyway.” Oh, he really hoped agreeing to this hadn’t been a mistake.

But if Klaus was chasing Barry, he wouldn’t be looking for Agatha. That would at least be a silver lining.

“Agatha.” Barry set a hand on her shoulder to get her attention. She looked up at him, expression fixed in an exaggerated mask of patience. “Agatha, these are jägers. You’re going to live with them now.”

Her expression didn’t change at all, of course. Barry ran a hand over his face, then gestured for the jägers to come closer. They scrambled. “Here, introduce yourselves. She probably won’t understand much else.”

A scuffle almost started between the purple and orange jägers trying to shove each other out of the way to get to her first, but before Barry could even glare at them the one with a ram horn punched both of them on the head as he passed, and shoved them aside to kneel in front of Agatha and point to himself. “Oggie.” The green jäger snorted, stepping probably deliberately on and over the orange jäger as he tried to get up.

Agatha stared at Oggie for another second before nodding seriously and pointing to herself. “‘Gatha!”

The jäger grinned like an idiot. Agatha apparently wasn’t scared of the teeth and just grinned back, pointing at his horn and babbling something in geisterspeak. “Yah, hy chust haff de vun horn,” Oggie agreed. It was a reasonable guess at what Agatha was saying, though since she couldn’t understand it probably didn’t matter what anyone said. “Iz not verra useful most ov de time.”

“Izn’t ever useful,” the orange jäger sniped as he got back to his feet.

Oggie appeared completely unbothered. “Hyu chust dun know de most important use ov horns.”

The green jäger had managed to crouch next to Oggie and get Agatha’s attention, pointing to himself. “Dimo.”

Agatha nodded more quickly this time, and again declared herself “’Gatha!” before reaching out to poke at Dimo’s face. He blinked and stared at her, not moving despite the best strength a three year old girl could muster to first continue poking him, and then grab some of his fur and tug. She giggled and declared something else in geisterspeak while Dimo looked pained, and Oggie made no attempt to hide his snickering.

Agatha then began climbing on Dimo, until she could sit on his shoulder as if it were a tree branch. He stayed, if possible, even more still, with the exception of his eyes moving in what appeared to be a determined attempt to watch her through the side of his own head. Well, who knew; maybe he could. Agatha looked very pleased with herself, and grinned at Oggie when he reached over to ruffle her hair.

…Maybe this wasn’t as bad an idea as Barry had thought.

“Hyu ken stand op,” Oggie said to Dimo. “Keeds haff goot grips.”

Dimo very slowly reached up to carefully hold onto Agatha’s leg, and watched Barry the entire time he stood. Once he was standing he froze again.

“…Hokay, mebbe hy carry her ven ve move,” Oggie said.

“Mebbe,” Dimo managed.

The orange jäger ignored them both, and took advantage of Agatha’s new eye level to stand in front of her and point at himself. “Ionel.”

Agatha had apparently figured out the pattern, and wasted no time pointing to herself. She even managed the a this time. “Agatha!” She also kicked the leg Dimo wasn’t holding and bounced cheerfully on his shoulder.

Dimo’s eyes went wide and his other hand was very quickly on Agatha’s other leg, while Ionel reached equally quickly to hold her shoulder. Barry couldn’t really blame Oggie for laughing, even though he probably would have grabbed her too if Dimo and Ionel hadn’t beaten him to it. Well, they certainly didn’t seem likely to be incautious with Agatha, at least.

Agatha had stilled when the jägers grabbed her, looking confused and saying something that sounded like a question. Ionel let go after a moment and moved to the side, allowing the purple jäger to move in.

…Or to stay a step further back and bow with a flourish. “Hy am Maxim, my lady Agatha.”

“You know she can’t understand any of that,” Barry said as Agatha stared.

“Iz no reason not to be polite,” Maxim said. But he did straighten up and point at himself. “Maxim.”

“Agatha!” This time, fortunately, Agatha did not kick or bounce, but she did wave energetically. (Not that Dimo looked any less terrified for it.) Maxim waved back, grinning.

Right. They couldn’t explain any more to Agatha, and there really wasn't a lot more to explain to jägers when they'd been told to keep a Heterodyne safe. Barry's presence here wasn't useful any longer. "I’ll send Punch and Judy here. If you don’t stay in this area, send someone back every month or so to check for them. Otherwise I’ll let you figure out what’s best to keep her safe.” All four—well, three of the jägers turned to focus on Barry again. Dimo apparently still didn’t dare to move any more than his eyes, but his expression became serious along with the rest.

“Hyu dun vant os vith hyu?”

Ionel at least didn’t sound like he expected Barry to invite them along. He still would have preferred not to have been asked, and was not at all upset by Maxim elbowing Ionel in the side. “No. I need to not be noticed or recognized. And Agatha needs to be protected.” Ionel looked vaguely irritated (though that might have been with Maxim) but the others just nodded, so Barry leaned over to Agatha. “Bye, Agatha. You stay safe, okay?”

Agatha said something cheerful and probably entirely oblivious to what was going on. He waved, and she waved back, still babbling.

Backing away was even harder than Barry had thought. But—counter to all logic—it actually helped a little that the jägers immediately clustered closer, focused entirely on Agatha.

She would be safe. Probably even a decent person, if he could convince Punch and Judy, and they would probably agree. But no matter what Agatha would be safe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those curious: Oggie guessed correctly and Agatha's comments after he introduces himself are about his horn and why he only has one of them. Her decision about Dimo after poking him is something along the lines of "soft/fluffy/fuzzy!" So basically she thinks he's a giant kitten that she can ride like the geisterdamen ride the spiders.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jenka wanders in, and wonders why the idiots she is trying to keep in one piece have a kid. And then they explain.

Jenka hadn’t really _needed_ to learn to expect absurdity from the jägers she’d wound up with for detachment. Absurdity was something she’d learned to expect from jägers regardless of scenario long before. And, on occasion, cheerfully joined in or started. She _was_ a jäger, just an unusually self-aware one.

She still wasn’t quite prepared to return from scouting to find a young child (girl, blond, misfitting clothes; little else to note with the wind blowing away) sitting happily on Oggie’s shoulders. The child had a grip on Oggie’s horn with one hand and the other twisted firmly in his hair. Oggie had one hand casually on the girl’s leg to hold her and was making strange faces which Ionel was imitating, and the girl was laughing at. Dimo looked like he’d recently escaped some great terror, similar to peasants that had just realized the Heterodyne army was only going through their town and not attacking it, and was watching the two of them interact with the child from a few steps away. Maxim was lingering by the edge of the clearing and eyeing the trees like they might attack, which wouldn’t have been too strange if it hadn’t been for the scene he was ignoring like it was normal.

“Hoy, Jenka.” Maxim nodded casually as Jenka stopped Füst near him and slid down the bear’s shoulder, but kept most of his attention on the forest.

Jenka ignored the forest. Füst would have reacted if there was anything nearby that could move and hadn’t already run. “Maxim, vhy iz there a keed?”

Maxim’s eyes slid over to her, and there was a rare amount of mischief in his grin before his gaze was back on the forest. “Go see.”

Hmph. Maxim was less inclined to mischief than many jägers (or perhaps just quieter in it; Jenka had never quite been able to tell), but very difficult to deter when he did come up with an idea. And Jenka wanted an explanation quickly. She went, patting Füst as she left so that he’d stay where he was. No need to terrify the kid and try to talk over her screaming.

Oggie turned as she approached, and broke into a manic grin which Ionel matched. “Jenka! Meet Miz Agatha.”

“Hello Miss Agatha,” Jenka said, without actually rolling her eyes, or looking at the kid. “Oggie, vhy hyu have a keed?”

Oggie and Ionel both grinned wider. Not mischievous like Maxim; just beaming. “Master Barry gave her to os!”

Jenka had to pause to process that statement. “You found Master Barry—”

“Yah!”

“—und he iz not here—”

“Vell….”

“—und he gave you a _keed_.” Jenka folded her arms.

Oggie grinned. Ionel nodded.

“ _Vhy_ did he give hyu a keed?”

“Vell, he ken’t take care ov her, und….”

“Jenka,” Maxim called from where he was probably still eyeing the trees, “meet Miz Agatha Heterodyne.”

Jenka blinked. Then she actually looked at the kid. That was not informative enough, so she leaned in to smell.

She mostly smelled Oggie, but Miss Agatha did smell like Heterodyne. She also said something in a language Jenka couldn’t recognize. Jenka backed up a step and stared as the world twisted around a little blond girl, who seemed to be perfectly at home hanging onto Oggie’s head.

…Well, that was improvement on one detail, anyway. And a huge problem on several others. “Oggie,” Jenka said, still watching Miss Agatha in case she did—well—anything, “vot are ve goink to do vith a keed?”

Oggie was still grinning. “Ve raise her, ov cawse!”

“ _How_?” It had been a while since Jenka had wanted to tear her hair out. Years, in fact. “This vos—this vos a _suicide mission_ , ve are _not prepared_ to take care ov a keed, und is _veeks_ to get beck to Mechanicsburg! Ve dun even have a vay to tell the others dey ken go home—”

Miss Agatha said something, and started wiggling. Oggie lifted her off his shoulders and set her on the ground, which was apparently the correct interpretation and incorrect decision, as Miss Agatha immediately ran for the side of the clearing. Oggie and Ionel chased after her. Jenka watched from the corner of her eye. There wasn’t anything dangerous in the clearing, as long as they could keep her from leaving it should be okay.

“Ectually,” Dimo said, “Master Barry said not to go to Mechanicsburg.”

“ _Vhy_?” Why keep a Heterodyne out of Mechanicsburg? And they were _jägers_ , they weren’t made to raise kids. That was almost the opposite of what they were made for; how could they raise a kid if they couldn’t even go to Mechanicsburg for help?

“He dun vant de Baron to know she eksists.” Dimo looked vaguely troubled, too. At least Jenka wasn’t the _only_ one who saw problems. “He sez not to go ennyvhere de Baron might notice.”

“…Because there iz a lot of places vhere five jägers, a bear und a keed vill not stand out at all,” Jenka said. Dimo made a face like he agreed.

It wasn’t like they had a choice, though. They had orders. They had a _Heterodyne_ , even if it wasn’t the one they’d thought they were going to die looking for. So they were going to be taking care of a kid. And not dying, not failing, that was _not an acceptable outcome_. Not any more.

Jenka sighed, and turned to where Oggie and Ionel were now following Miss Agatha in her explorations of the clearing’s edges. “Oggie, vot do keeds need?”

“Food, vhich ken’t all be meat, vater, vhich haz to be clean,” Oggie called back. “Und clothes, und not beink in de rain or de cold too long. Und sleep und toys.”

“I don’t think toys iz the same az the rest of those,” Jenka said.

Oggie looked up to stare at her like she was stupid, and then went back to watching Miss Agatha. “She iz schpark keed. If she dun haff toys, ve vill _be_ de toys.”

“Hokay, but ve get the rest of the stuff first,” Jenka said.

“Hy iz tinking ve ken find a town,” Dimo started, “und den hope de others kom close so ve ken get dem to help.”

Jenka turned to him, torn between relief that someone had ideas and irritation at what the idea was. “Ve can’t go to a town, someone vould notice us.”

“Ve could go to a town vith no pipple in eet,” Maxim added from his edge of the clearing. “Vould have buildinks und vater, et least. Und ve ken hunt.”

That was closer to a good plan. “Only for meat,” Jenka pointed out. “Und the closest dead town iz still a veek North ov here. Iz a start, though.”

“Vould a tent be goot?” Dimo asked.

“Yah,” Oggie said.

“So ve get a tent, und food, und ve go to a town vith no more pipple, und ve make it so Miz Agatha ken live dere,” Dimo said. “Und vhen Miz Agatha is safe, Jenka ken go to de Generals to report.”

It still wasn’t perfect, but it was probably the best plan they’d be able to come up with. And better than most plans jägers acted on. Jenka nodded. “Hokay. Then ve go to Hufftberg, und get a tend und food und… votever else Oggie sez.”

“Tartown iz closer,” Ionel said.

“Yez, but iz the wrong vay,” Jenka said. “Hufftberg iz North. Und ve can still get there today.”

“Not if Miz Agatha iz valkink,” Dimo said.

“Hy ken carry her,” Oggie said.

“Und then how vill hyu carry the poleaxe?” Jenka asked. “I think keeds take two hands.”

Oggie paused, and then jumped after Miss Agatha as she ran back toward the center of the clearing. “Hyu ken carry eet. Hy ken get sumting to carry eet in Hufftberg.”

Harnesses took time to make and there might not be one already made. Jenka would have pointed that out, except Miss Agatha came to a stop in front of her and beamed up at Jenka, holding a flower up for Jenka to see. Jenka stared. Miss Agatha said something and waved the flower at her. Jenka looked for Oggie. “Vot do I do?”

“Hy tink she iz givink eet to hyu,” Oggie said.

…Well, it wasn’t like Jenka could tell Heterodynes no, even if she didn’t need a flower. She knelt down so she was closer, and solemnly accepted the flower. “Thank hyu, Miss Agatha.” (Ionel snickered, but Jenka could punch him later.)

Oggie must have been right, because Miss Agatha grinned at her, and then pointed at herself. “Agatha!”

Oh. Jenka could do introductions. She pointed at herself. “Jenka.”

Miss Agatha grinned and said something which Jenka assumed probably meant hello. She then, before Jenka could react, attached herself to Jenka’s middle in a much stronger hug than Jenka would have expected a three year old human to be capable of. She froze, and then looked at Oggie again.

Oggie was very visibly trying not to laugh. (Ionel was laughing, but this still wasn’t the time to punch him.) “Now hyu hug her beck.”

Okay, that was probably obvious. Jenka very carefully wrapped both arms around Miss Agatha, making sure not to hug her too hard or to crush the flower. It was apparently the correct thing to do, as Agatha let go after a minute and said something that sounded cheerful.

She then took the flower back, and began attempting to tangle it in Jenka’s hair. Ionel kept laughing. Jenka continued thinking about the best time to punch him.

Miss Agatha was eventually appeased when the flower was tucked into the brim of Jenka’s hat, and Jenka was rescued by Oggie sweeping her up onto his shoulders again. They introduced her to Füst (Agatha was not at all afraid, and instead reached out to pat Füst on the nose. Füst looked just as taken aback as Jenka felt), Ionel collected Oggie’s poleaxe, and then they began the trip to Hufftberg.

The dead town they’d been aiming for turned out to be too close to a road; there were signs of people near it, and Jenka was sure they’d start venturing into the town soon if they hadn’t already, so the pack turned Southeast for a town that was further away, but also only near roads which led to that town and nowhere else, so no one should stumble into them.

By that time the others had gotten around to filling Jenka in on the rest of their conversation with Master Barry, and they’d run into another wild pack of three jägers, who immediately joined them. Jenka stayed with the group anyway. None of the messages she needed to take to the Generals would change with time, and while seven jägers should be enough to protect Miss Agatha from _almost_ anything in the Wastelands, one more and a war-bear wouldn’t hurt.

Plus, she was getting sort of fond of the flowers Miss Agatha insisted on adding to her hat every morning. Even if she wouldn't ever admit it in Ionel's hearing.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A three week timeskip, during which the jägers try to teach Agatha Romanian, rebuild a town, and Agatha continues to make every jäger sentimental about flowers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am (obviously) going to be using a _lot_ of jägers in this story. If you have any you'd like to see included, or if you'd like something that isn't quite a full character yet like "I want to see a jäger with scales instead of skin or fur," let me know and I'll almost certainly be able to include them. The Generals are prettymuch the only ones that can't show up (yet); jägers that joined the Baron will just have to get dramatically injured and fake going to Mamma Gkika's first. I'll add credit in the first chapter any new jägers show up in.
> 
> Thumbing your nose, in case anyone isn't familiar with it, is what Oggie is doing in the last panel [here](http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20120427), and is roughly equivalent to flipping someone off. (Which probably makes it a gesture of affection among jägers, but nonetheless.)
> 
> Credit for this chapter!
> 
> [lilithqueen](http://archiveofourown.org/users/lilithqueen/pseuds/lilithqueen) is the creator of [Dana](http://notapaladin.tumblr.com/post/130664184414/dana-vasilescu-jaeger-cavalry-seen-on-the-left) [Vasilescu](http://notapaladin.tumblr.com/post/131584171239/outtakes-that-didnt-make-it-into-the-latest), the war octopus incident, the headcanon that Oggie had at least seven daughters and therefore is very good at raising kids and all the jägers know it, the toy horse, Maxim's backstory (which is really only referenced by which flower names he knows, but will probably appear more later)... honestly unless otherwise noted you can probably just assume half of this fic from this point on is her idea.
> 
> [cinder_ember](http://archiveofourown.org/users/cinder_ember/pseuds/cinder_ember) is the creator of [Aleksandra Ivanova](http://cinder-ember.tumblr.com/post/132370491124/to-anyone-reading-best-of-bad-plans-on-ao3), as well as several other OC jägers that will be showing up in future chapters (and credited in the notes then, of course).

The town Jenka and Dimo had chosen to stay in had been abandoned for a reason. Specifically, the Other and his revenants.

The revenants had mostly left before the pack and Agatha got there, although they ran into a few on the way. (Oggie didn’t get to fight any of them, which would have been more disappointing if it hadn’t been because he was carrying the Heterodyne heir the entire time instead.) They cleared the town out as soon as they reached it (and then went through it two more times, because no one was taking any chances), and then filled up the cracks in the walls with rocks, sticks and mud.

That made the town as secure as they could quickly get it, which actually wasn’t bad. Starkholdt (as a cracked sign proclaimed) had once been an impressively defensible fort. It was halfway up a mountain, separated from any other towns by other mountains, had an impressive wall, only one entrance, a mountain stream and two wells for water. The buildings were almost entirely difficult to burn stone, and it had previously had a castle designed just as much for defense as the town itself, and with space to take in most of the population if necessary. It would have been really fun to raid.

It had also been owned for generations by an old (and unusually stable) Spark family, which was probably why it had been the target of one of the Other’s attacks. The castle had been smashed to pieces, really only recognizable as a former castle because it was such a _large_ pile of rubble, and because Aleks shocked herself on the remains of the lightning moat that had surrounded it. (There was a minor explosion, and Aleks temporarily gained the ability to fly. Agatha hadn’t been close enough to be in danger, so it was very funny.)

Most of the other buildings had been damaged as well, but they found a house with intact walls, patched up the roof, Lucian somehow wove tree branches together to lean over the door frame, and that became Agatha’s. Jenka, Mircea and Toma left, Jenka to contact the Generals, and Mircea and Toma to search for other jägers and start spreading the word to meet up, while the rest of them figured out how to turn the town into something several jägers and a human could live in. (Agatha threw a tantrum, which probably would have ended much sooner if any of them had been able to speak whatever language she knew. Once Oggie managed to convince her that Jenka and the others would be back, Agatha started leaving flowers at the gate every morning. She’d kept it up even after Jenka returned.)

They hunted, and between the nineteen jägers who’d arrived so far they could identify a lot of edible plants and berries, so food was actually pretty easy to take care of. The town also provided water and shelter and they’d found some old toys. (Agatha’s favorite was a little wooden horse with wheels. Oggie had replaced the string for her, several times already. She preferred to tie the string to her ankle and pull the horse around after her that way, which usually meant they had to cut the end of the string off every night. Agatha was much better at tying knots than anyone was at untying them.)

The furniture the town had contained had mostly been reduced to the status of firewood, which was useful and mostly not a problem, except it left Agatha without a bed. They’d made one for her, or at least made a pile of blankets and extra clothes she could sleep in, but she had yet to actually be found in it in the morning.

This morning was no different. Oggie glanced into the room Agatha was supposed to be sleeping in, saw no one sleeping in the bed, and continued looking.

Dimo was sitting against the wall next to the door, looking very tired, with Agatha sprawled asleep in his lap, one hand clinging to his shirt. She had apparently dragged a blanket over with her, but the way it was carefully tucked around her was probably Dimo. Oggie started grinning.

Dimo glowered at him. “Oggie.”

“Haff hyu effen moved hyu hand?”

Dimo kept the same expression, like he really wanted to glare and couldn’t quite. “She vos sleepink.”

Oggie moved the rest of the way into the room, and dropped down to sit across from Dimo. He kept grinning. “Hy dun tink she vould vake op eef hyu moved hyu hand out from under her hair.”

Dimo glared. He probably would have been folding his arms, but that would have meant moving. “Iz not chust her hair, her head iz against mine thumb.”

Oggie started snickering. “Hyu know, hy dun tink hyu iz a jäger ennymore,” he said. “Hyu is chust a bed.”

Dimo glared, then stuck his nose in the air. “Hy em _protectink_ de Heterodyne from de cold und from gettink uncomfortable sleepink on de floor.”

“Yah,” Oggie said around snickers. “Iz vot beds do.”

Agatha must not have been touching Dimo’s other hand, because he used it to thumb his nose at Oggie. Oggie started cackling.

That woke Agatha up, which made Dimo scowl at Oggie, but it was time for her to get up anyway. She rolled over, mumbled something in the language no one knew, and then frowned like she was thinking hard. After a second her face cleared and she chirped “Goot mornink Mamma!” at Dimo and “Goot mornink Poppa!” at Oggie.

Oggie did not laugh, mostly because he had the first time Agatha called Dimo Mamma a week and a half ago, and then Dimo had punched him, and then Agatha had gotten confused and then upset.

Dimo didn’t even roll his eyes. Instead he patted her on the head. “Yah, goot mornink Agatha.”

“Hyu vant to get flowers?” Oggie asked.

Agatha rolled out of Dimo’s lap, quick enough to make him twitch as he suppressed the instinct to grab her. “Fl’wers!”

Dimo eyed Oggie. “Not food?”

“She dun eat much onless she gets de flowers first, hyu know dot.” Oggie caught Agatha as she tried to run for the door, and set her on his shoulders. She grabbed onto his horn and hair, and leaned forward to say something a bit louder than he would have liked in his ear. He stood up and moved toward the window. "Hyu comink?"

“Nah.” Dimo sunk down against the wall, pulling his hat down over his eyes. “Hy’m goink to schleep.”

They should probably just assign Dimo as Agatha’s nighttime guard, since she always insisted on sleeping on him and he always stayed awake, in case he moved in his sleep and squished her. Dimo organized most of the guards and patrols, though, and kept insisting on mixing himself in with the rest of them. Oggie rolled his eyes, and carefully leaned out the window so Agatha didn’t bump her head or fall. “Hoy, Jenka!”

“Fl’wers!” Agatha added.

Jenka bounded onto a nearby roof and waved, so Oggie ducked back in, and made his way down the stairs and out the door.

Aleks had been the official, non-Dimo guard for Agatha since dawn, and looked like a werewolf; much more animalistic than most jägers. She landed next to them as soon as Oggie got out the door, and Agatha called “goot mornink Mamma Aleks!” both cheerfully and still more loudly than Oggie would have preferred near his ears.

Aleks’s ears had already been up but she grinned, showing off a normal number of teeth (by jäger standards) in a very unusual pattern (by any standards not canine). “Goot mornink Miz Agatha. Iz hyu gettink flowers?”

“Yah, fl’wers!” Agatha agreed. She let go of Oggie so she could spread her arms as wide as she could reach. “Fl’wers und fl’wers und… und _fl’wers_!”

“Lotz ov flowers?” Aleks asked.

“Lotz ov fl’wers!” Agatha agreed. “Lotz ov verra… pretty fl’wers!”

“Jenka vill haff a verra nize hat today,” Oggie said.

Aleks’s grin widened. “Efferyvun vill haff a nize hat.”

“Hy only get vun flower.” Jenka had been getting enough to go all the way around her hat ever since she got back. Hm, maybe…. Oggie reached up for Agatha’s arm, and she let him guide it back to his horn and hung on. Good. He _could_ hold her but he’d rather she be holding on too.

He set Agatha down once they reached where Jenka was waiting below the wall, and flowers had grown wild in the bare dirt since the town was empty. She cheered, ran to hug "Poppa Jenka!" and then began running around inspecting and then collecting the flowers. Oggie, Aleks and Jenka followed, trying to teach her the names of the flowers they knew. (They knew very few of them. Maxim called some down from where he was watching the nearby forest for wandering clanks and constructs from the top of the wall, but Oggie thought he was just translating Russian names. Agatha didn’t seem to mind.)

Agatha collected several handfuls of flowers before Oggie got her to sit still, and started teaching her how to weave them together into crowns. _That_ might have been more effective if he’d remembered how on the first try, and not had to experiment a few times while Agatha watched with exaggerated patience. Aleks tried making fun of him for not remembering, so he bet her she couldn’t figure it out on the first try either. (She didn’t, and Oggie didn’t have to make dinner that night, _and_ she stopped trying to make fun of him.) Jenka refused to bet, but she did make a crown.

Agatha paid attention long enough to figure out what Oggie was doing almost as soon as he got it right, made two crowns (one noticeably larger than the other), and then immediately began experimenting in what Oggie was sure was an attempt to figure out a new and better way to make flower crowns. She was definitely going to be a spark.

They had nine flower crowns (one made by Jenka, two by Oggie, four by Agatha, and two by Aleks) of varying sizes and durability (and had taken two breaks to gather more flowers) when a whistle came from the gate.

It wasn’t a warning whistle; depending on the situation, it could mean “friendly arrival,” “nothing fun is happening,” or “there are no stories and might be paperwork, send the most gullible officer.” (The jägers had a lot of whistles to communicate various types of attacks and danger; they really only had the one to communicate “no attack.”) In this case, Oggie chose to interpret it as “a new jäger has arrived,” since anyone who’d already been in the town wouldn’t have whistled at all.

Which meant Agatha would want to meet him, and he would want to meet Agatha. Agatha started to run for the gate when she understood there was a new jäger, but stopped after a few steps and ran back to collect the flowers. She solemnly presented Jenka with one of the crowns she’d woven, and picked out loose flowers for Oggie and Aleks. Then she piled three of the crowns on her head (one immediately started slipping down), handed the rest to Aleks to carry, collected the loose flowers, and started running for the gate again with flowers clenched in both fists and one crown starting to slip over her eye.

Getting to the gate meant running most of the way across the town before they could turn onto the main street, and when they could the gate was already close. Oggie recognized the colors at the gate before he could see Dana’s face, and was suddenly very glad there weren’t any large bodies of water nearby. There probably was not an unexpected war octopus living in the stream or wells for Dana to try befriending.

…He might tell Dimo to have someone check the forest for unexpected war eagles, though. Or any other war animal that wasn’t Füst.

Oggie and Aleks slowed as the gate came close (Jenka had jumped up to the roofs several streets back), but Agatha kept running as fast as she could until she skidded to a stop, staring up from under a now nearly sideways flower crown as Dana turned away from her conversation with Ionel.

Both of them stared. Agatha looked like she was completely in awe of Dana, which was completely not fair; Oggie had been teaching jägers how to take care of her for three weeks and she’d never looked at _him_ like that. Hmph. Dana looked equally amazed, surprised and hopeful and maybe a little desperate as she stared down at the youngest Heterodyne.

Agatha broke the spell by breathing out, “pretty, verra pretty,” pointing at herself with one hand still full of flowers to declare, “Hy Agatha!” and then staring expectantly at Dana.

Dana blinked, surprised, and kneeled down in front of Agatha. “I am Dana. Und hyu iz verra pretty too, Miz Agatha.” A smile was starting to spread over her face; so was a blush.

Agatha beamed, then spun around to stare expectantly at Aleks. “Fl’wers?”

Aleks laughed, ears up and tail waving cheerfully, and moved over to crouch next to Agatha and Dana. Agatha handed her the loose flowers and began sorting through the flower crowns with a frown of complete concentration, and Oggie went to stand by Ionel. “Novun else?”

“Nah, chust Dana. She sez she vos travelink alone.” Ionel’s forehead was wrinkled, like he couldn’t understand how that was possible.

Oggie shrugged. He couldn’t either. He wanted to lean on his poleaxe, but it was hard to carry while he was carrying Agatha, so he didn’t have it with him. He needed to get a harness for it. “Vell, she iz here now.” Twenty jägers wasn’t a lot, but it was way better than the way they had been split up. And more would come. And they had a home base to come back to, and a Heterodyne in it. This would work.

Agatha laughed triumphantly, not really a spark’s cackling but with closer to the right harmonics than some civilians ever got in their lives, and held up a flower crown. She turned to Dana and set the crown carefully over Dana’s hat, grinning. A few of the flowers had been crushed a bit and the crown hung down a little on the side of Dana’s hat which still had the brim folded up, but Agatha seemed happy with it, and started sorting through the loose flowers again.

“I vondered vhy hyu all had flowers,” Dana said. She sounded relieved. Oggie decided that was probably still about Agatha and not the flowers.

“She iz givink efferyvun flowers effery day,” Aleks said, still patiently holding the flowers for Agatha to look through. Agatha ignored them.

“Iz Jenka’s fault,” Oggie said, and ducked under a rock that flew past where his shoulder had been.

“Vot deed Jenka—”

Dana broke off as Agatha crowed in triumph again, and spun around with several matching flowers in her hands. She gave Dana a serious look, ordered her to “stay!” and began trying to thread the flowers into the buttons of Dana’s jacket.

Ionel started snickering.

“I ken alvays ponch hyu later,” Dana said in German.

“Hyu dun haff a horse, hyu ken’t catch me.”

Dana was definitely going to fight Ionel later since he said _that_ , but Agatha tugged impatiently on her jacket, and Dana went back to watching Agatha decorate her with flowers.

Oggie elbowed Ionel. “Go und tell… whoeffer iz cookink now dot Dana vill be eatink too.”

Ionel elbowed Oggie back. “Hy’m _guardink_ de _gate_. Hyu go.”

Oggie rolled his eyes, but did not elbow Ionel back, because then he’d never leave. “Dere iz four jägerkin here now, de gate iz guarded. Und _hyu_ haff an ekscuse to leave after hyu tell dem.”

Ionel considered that, then sighed. “Hokay, hy vill be beck in a minute.”

No one else seemed to notice him leave, so Oggie went to stand by the gate. Anything that was actually dangerous to twenty jägers would probably be smart enough to stay away, but there was no point in taking risks.

Besides, Dana and Aleks clearly weren’t paying attention to guarding anything that wasn’t the Heterodyne now. Even Jenka had jumped down to help teach Agatha how to say the colors of the different flowers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone wondering: Oggie taught Agatha to call all the jägers Mamma or Poppa ( _mostly_ intentionally). He taught her to call Dimo Mamma because he thought it would be funny and that she wouldn't keep it up for long. (He was wrong, of course. He is lucky Dimo hasn't realized it's his fault yet.) He also taught Agatha to call Aleks Mamma, because she is a lady jäger. He didn't teach her anything specific about Jenka, because this happened while Jenka was off reporting to the Generals, and taught her to call the rest of the jägers that were around Poppa, because they were not lady jägers.
> 
> Dimo and Aleks also just so happened to be the only present jägers with fur at the time.
> 
> So now Agatha thinks that the difference between "Mamma" and "Poppa" is "has fur" and "doesn't have fur."
> 
>  _This is why you don't use small children to play pranks, Oggie._ You should know this already.
> 
> The actual meanings will probably be explained to Agatha eventually. (Dimo's prettymuch stuck as Agatha's Mamma now, though, even if she changes what she calls all the other jägers. It's too late for him.)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More fluff, more arrivals, more flowers. Small Heterodynes should not be given jäger-sharp daggers. And Maxim is bad at flirting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Credits for this chapter!
> 
> Dana and Aleks were cited in the previous chapter.
> 
> [adiduck](http://archiveofourown.org/users/book_people/pseuds/adiduck) is the creator of [Premisl](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4676600/chapters/10841054), [Stanislava/Stani](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4676600/chapters/11371495) (who will get a proper appearance later), and [Lyubo](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4676600/chapters/11045381). (Links go to their Atmospheric Electricity chapters, the profiles are [this one](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4676600/chapters/12011681).)
> 
> [littlemisscodeless](http://littlemisscodeless.tumblr.com/) is the creator of [Dragomir/Dragos](http://littlemisscodeless.tumblr.com/post/133224394819/hey-firecoloredwater-are-you-still-looking-for).
> 
> [cinder_ember](http://archiveofourown.org/users/cinder_ember/pseuds/cinder_ember) is the creator of [Valentin](http://cinder-ember.tumblr.com/post/132370491124/to-anyone-reading-best-of-bad-plans-on-ao3) and [Darius](http://cinder-ember.tumblr.com/post/132381580144/to-anyone-reading-best-of-bad-plans-on-ao3), as well as Aleks (cited in the previous chapter). (Forgot to add this, sorry! All three are only mentioned in this chapter, but will appear properly/again later.)

"Dot's goot, bot hyu foot should be here—dot's right. Und now, hyu attack!" Maxim demonstrated a powerful high slash with his sword, grinning. 

"Ha!" Miss Agatha was grinning too. Her mimicry wasn't exactly right—okay, it was pretty far off—but she did slash the dagger Maxim was having her practice with in a fairly similar arc. (She couldn't hold a sword yet, but maybe by next year….) She then wobbled on her right foot, which she'd put too much weight on. 

She also used the wobble to spin and grin at Maxim. Poor execution of the technique, but good instinct for adapting; one of those was a _lot_ easier to improve with practice than the other. Maxim grinned and patted her on the head. 

"Hokay, now hyu do eet again. Iz practice, yah?"

"Hokay!" Miz Agatha said, and tried to get back into the proper stance.

"Remember hyu foot, Miz—"

"Maxim vot iz hyu _doink_?!"

Maxim jumped, and put on his best innocent expression as he turned to look at Oggie. "Hy em teachink her to fight.”

“She iz—iz—” Oggie paused, and looked down at Miss Agatha, who was staring at him curiously. “How old iz hyu, Miz Agatha?”

Her face wrinkled in confusion. “Old?”

“Hokay, ve dunno how old she iz.” Oggie turned back to Maxim. “Bot she is too young for dot!”

Maxim sheathed his sword, folded his arms, and certainly did not pout. “She iz Heterodyne, she vill need to protect herself—”

“Not now!” Oggie waved his arms the way that indicated he was about to start pulling his own hair out. Or hauling someone around by the ear and yelling at them for being an idiot. “Iz vot ve iz for!”

“Master Barry tinks ve ken’t trust ennyvun.” And Miss Agatha was tugging on his arm. Maxim glanced down, and patted her on the head. She grabbed for his hand. Huh, she hadn’t minded being patted before. He let her have it. “Und ve dun haff most ov de pack here, und effen vhen ve do ve iz not always _enough_.”

Oggie froze, and then drooped. Maxim almost felt bad for pointing it out, but he was _right_. Miss Agatha was in a lot of danger and needed to be able to protect herself if she was ever alone. “Yah, hokay,” Oggie said. “Bot no veapons. She iz too young, she vill chust hurt herself vith dem.”

“Iz chust a small—”

“ _No veapons_ , Maxim.”

Maxim sighed. Agatha had started tugging on his hand. “Hokay, hokay, no veapons yet. Bot hy dunno if ve ken teach her to fight vitout dem, she dun haff claws. Yez, Miz Agatha?”

She looked up at him with an expression that he was pretty sure she intended to be serious and commanding. “Come.”

“Hokay.” If she was going to distract herself so Maxim didn’t have to tell her to give the dagger back, he certainly wasn’t going to complain. “Vhere?”

“ _Come_ ,” she repeated. The tone was probably meant to be stern. Presumably so was the look she gave Oggie. “Poppa, come!”

“Hokay, ve is comink.” Oggie somehow managed to get the dagger out of Agatha’s hand and let her hang onto his hand instead. The dagger vanished—unsheathed, because Oggie was an idiot—into his belt while Maxim was busy wondering how he’d done it. Maxim threw the sheath at his head. He caught it, unfortunately. “Vhere iz ve goink, Miz Agatha?”

“Fl’wers!”

Oh. Maxim supposed he might have looked a little disappointed when he agreed not to teach Miss Agatha to use weapons. And Oggie certainly had when Maxim pointed out how much danger she was in.

Miss Agatha’s habit of solving everything with flowers was probably going to have consequences eventually. If nothing else, it would upset her when winter came.

…In the meantime it mostly meant that the jägers in town were noticeably more colorful compared to normal, which Maxim approved of. So many of his brothers were so utterly boring in their dress, maybe this would inspire them. Perhaps when winter got close someone could teach Miss Agatha to make flowers out of paper or fabric…. “Oggie, she iz old enough for scizzors, yah?”

Oggie stared at him as he finished replacing the dagger in its sheath. “Vot?”

“Scizzors. So she ken make flowers out ov paper or fabric durink de vinter.”

“Ve dun haff paper or fabric _or_ scissors,” Oggie said.

“Ve ken get dem, ve vill need fabric for vinter clothes for her ennyvay….”

The conversation became a debate, of course, and continued well after they reached the nearest flower field and Miss Agatha began picking flowers. Oggie thought they should focus on carrying more important supplies that jägers wouldn’t look so strange buying, Maxim thought Miss Agatha would need something to do all winter. Miss Agatha ignored them, collecting flowers and weaving them into crowns.

~---~---~---~---~

Miss Agatha usually got to delay breakfast until after she’d picked flowers, but once she started eating any meal she wasn’t supposed to leave until she’d finished. Or more accurately, once she left, they weren’t supposed to give her anything else to eat until the next meal. Maxim thought it seemed unnecessary, but Oggie said if she was allowed to eat at any time she wouldn’t eat at meals at all. (Usually when Miss Agatha left early they just ended up taking her out of the town with a party of jägers to teach her how to identify edible plants in the area, so Maxim was pretty sure Oggie was wrong.)

The only noticeable result of Oggie’s mealtime policy had been Miss Agatha quickly adopting jäger table manners. This bothered a grand total of absolutely no one in the town, of course; eating fast and talking while you did it was just _practical_. (There had been some brief debate about whether teaching her human table manners would be a good idea in case she needed them later on as the Heterodyne, but no one could agree on what human table manners actually _were_ , so they decided she could always learn that later.)

Lunch was loud; a little more than a month after running into Master Barry and being given Miss Agatha and two weeks after settling in the town, there were now thirty-seven jägers living in it. A very sparse population, compared to the size of the town (able to hold about three thousand people, Maxim thought) or the total number of jägers (one thousand nine hundred and eighty six, minus whatever recent casualties Maxim didn’t yet know about—hopefully few).

Thirty-seven jägers were, nonetheless, plenty to make lunch both very loud and very chaotic. They’d gotten out of their initial tendency to have every single jäger individually trying to bring Miss Agatha her food (Miss Agatha had ended up with far more than she could eat, and eaten herself sick a few times before learning to just give the rest away to nearby jägers), but there were still conversations (at outdoor jäger volume), arguments (at even higher volume), the occasional fight (which Miss Agatha watched with promising interest), and the obligatory yelling between whoever had been stuck cooking and whoever was stupid enough to complain about the food.

Agatha ignored it as well as the rest of the jägers did now. She briefly climbed up on Dimo to look around the town square with a frown (he froze, sandwich halfway to his mouth, with a longsuffering expression), but Oggie picked her up and set her back down as he walked past on the way to get his own lunch, and she started eating as quickly as she could.

Maxim glanced over the square, deemed a fight reasonably likely (it smelled like Toma had tried experimenting with adding the old spices he’d found to the venison again), and jumped up to a roof with his plate. Normally he’d be happy to stay in the middle of a brewing fight, but the flower crown Miss Agatha made him that morning was still (mostly) fresh and would be too easily damaged, and all the spots nearest Miss Agatha were already taken.

Miss Agatha eating as quickly as she could before running off was expected; she usually only ate slowly if someone was showing her how to build something out of the food, which Oggie usually tried to prevent. (He often failed, but he usually tried. Occasionally he started building things with his food too.) Valentin and Darius ate quickly and followed her, which was also normal; Dana ate quickly and vanished in another direction, which was more confusing.

The expected fight began only shortly after they vanished, and Maxim was joined by Jenka, Lucien, and most of the others who’d initially been sitting near Miss Agatha, since her presence wouldn’t keep them out of the fighting anymore. Everyone but Jenka still had food, and joined Maxim making bets on the fight as it spread; Jenka proved to have a handful of small rocks, and tossed a few into the fight every time it looked like it would die out until Maxim pushed her off the roof. (Then she threw a rock at him, and he had to jump down and punch her, and then he was involved in the fight anyway. It was fun, and he managed to keep the flowers from being crushed, so he decided not to plot anything against Jenka entirely because she hadn’t caused him any real trouble and not because of the trouble she would cause him if she found out he was planning anything.)

The fight ended when Miss Agatha returned with armfuls of flowers, at which point Maxim noticed Dana on another roof, sketching with a surprisingly large grin for the focus art was supposed to take. He took that as an invitation to bother her, and climbed up.

Maxim caught a glimpse of a page full of small sketches of assorted jägers in various scuffles before she turned it, and began sketching Miss Agatha passing out flowers to the jägers that hadn’t yet been given one that day. Really, they were going to run out of flowers at this rate. Maxim could hardly disturb Dana when she was sketching Miss Agatha, though, so he settled on the roof a few feet away.

…That was boring, so he moved to the roof behind Dana.

That was also boring, so he leaned forward to peer at the sketches. “Hy dun tink dose flowers iz ektually gray.”

Dana hit him in the nose without even looking, and Maxim yelped automatically. That was _cheating_. It had to be. “Iz charcoal, schot op.”

“Nah, dose iz flowers—”

“Hyu iz an eediot,” Dana informed him. “I em vorkink, now schot op.”

Maxim sighed loudly, and leaned back. “Vel, hy guess hy ken enjoy de view.”

There was a pause, in which Dana did not answer.

“Hyu know, hyu iz lookink verra nize today, Miz Dana—”

“I em _vorkink_!”

“Hy see, end hy em certain dot eet vill look almost az nice az hyu iz lookink today.”

Three minutes later, Dana threw Maxim off the roof.

Maxim landed a bit harder than he otherwise would have, since he had to snatch his hat and flower crown off his head and hold them to be sure they weren’t crushed in the fall. He took that as a de-invitation to bother Dana, and after brushing himself off, wandered toward the gate.

Halfway to the gate, he spotted a flock of birds scattering out of the trees near the path about a quarter mile away.

Then another one. Closer.

Maxim started running. “Hoy! Sumtink comink!”

Not all the jägers followed him running for the gate; only about a quarter did, while another quarter jumped up to roofs to watch, and half stayed in the square with Agatha, to keep her calm by pretending nothing was happening, and to defend her or take her and flee if necessary.

It turned out to be entirely unnecessary. There was in fact something coming, but it was harmless, if a bit unusual: an enthusiastically bounding (and, once within sight, yelling and cheering) group of about thirty jägers. Maxim called back that it was more jägers (he’d been the one to start the alert, after all), and leaned on the wall, watching as they approached.

“Hoy, open de gates!” someone yelled once they got close, and a few of the town jägers jumped down to do that.

Maxim grinned. “Vot, ken’t hyu jump ennymore?”

“Mamma sez Hy’m not allowed to yet, zo no!”

“Hy von’t tell!” Nor would there be anything to tell about, it seemed, since the gates were almost open now.

“That is why I am here! And I most certainly will tell!” The arriving jägers started streaming through the gates, laughing and shouting a dozen conversations among themselves and the town jägers. The town jägers abruptly went quiet at the unaccented voice.

Maxim spotted the human (woman, slung over Premisl’s shoulders, looking resigned to her position) and landed with three others in a tight half circle blocking Premisl’s path. Premisl grinned at them from below his hat, and a fresh network of healing scars.

Actually, almost all the jägers in this group had fresh scars. The ones that didn’t mostly had bandages, or were limping. There was something really weird going on. “Vot iz dis?”

The woman huffed, and banged a fist against Premisl’s back. “Put me _down_ now, thank you.” Premisl obeyed, which was slightly reassuring since he wouldn’t just set down an enemy captive in a town _with the Heterodyne heir_ but at the same time explained _absolutely nothing_.

“Vell, ve vos all vith Vulfenbach,” Premisl said. That explained the scars. “Bot den, de Generals say Master Barry sez not to vork for him, so ve get nize veesible injuries—”

“And they all _terribly overdo it_ , so suddenly we have three times as many jägers coming in, and all of them _cheering_ about it,” the woman said. Her tone was only slightly less exasperated than her words. She brushed a few wrinkles out of her skirt, looked over the jägers surrounding and looming at her, and apparently chose Maxim as the one in charge. He had a brief moment to be appalled before she had closed the distance and held her hand out to him. “ _I_ am Elena. Mamma Gkika sent me because she knows _none_ of you can take care of yourselves.”

“…Hy tink Hy should be offended,” Maxim said. He bowed and kissed her hand anyway.

She scoffed at him. “Be offended if you want. Now who here has gotten themselves injured?”

“Erm… chust Toma und Cosmin und Aleks, but Aleks vos fine efter she voke op, und vos chust a leedle scratch on Cosmin, und Toma ken valk again already,” Maxim said. There really hadn’t been any significant injuries! It was hard to injure a jäger, and they were all being careful. It would be horrible to be injured and then unable to fight if something _did_ attack the town, after all.

Elena still didn’t look impressed. “I’ll decide that. Where are they?” Maxim pointed in the direction of the town square and she marched off, snapping orders at Stanislava and Jorgi not to disappear, she might need those bandages and medications they were carrying.

“…Zo Mamma sent _her_ ,” Maxim said once she was far enough away to pretend she was out of earshot.

Premisl was grinning. “Yah! Hy tink de odder gurls must haff suggested eet, she vos chust as bossy et dem too.”

Maxim considered that. “Hyu tink she ken be bossy et Dimo?”

“Hy guess. Vhy Dimo?”

“Miz Agatha sleeps on him effery night, zo he neffer sleeps, bot den he schedules himself for all de patrols too.” Maxim shook his head, carefully sad. “Zo now he neffer sleeps, und iz alvays tired und grumpy.”

“Ho, yah den. Hyu tell her dot, she vill be after him ontil he sleeps. Hrm, or mebbe she tell Miz Agatha to not schleep on him, Hy dunno….”

Maxim snorted. “She ken tell Miz Agatha dot, eet von’t vork.”

“She iz stubborn?” It took a second for Maxim to catch the longing note in Premisl’s voice. Premisl hid it better than a lot of jägers did at first, and most of the town jägers had been around long enough that they’d started adjusting, started expecting Miss Agatha to be there instead of being amazed all over again every time they saw her.

But Premisl hadn’t, so Maxim grinned at him and pointed ahead. “She iz op dere too, ve vos havink lunch.”

“Ooh, lunch?”

Premisl’s eyes snapped ahead of them, like he could see through the corners they had to turn into the square if he tried hard enough. Maxim looked to the side just long enough to confirm his memory of the newest voice; Lyubo. Who also had a fresh set of scars _and_ was limping, wow. What had they done to get away? “Yah, lunch, bot hyu iz late, most ov os iz finished already.”

Lyubo drooped. “Bot de foods….”

“Vell, Toma vos eksperimentink vit de spices again, dere might be some left eef hyu hurry—”

“Ooh!” Lyubo perked up. “Hokay, see hyu vhen hyu get dere!”

“ _Lyubo_!” Elena’s voice echoed back, “if you run I will write to Mamma, and I will make you carry the letter!”

Lyubo froze half a step into a sprint, and slunk—at a walking pace—the rest of the way to the square.

Maxim was _definitely_ setting Elena on Dimo as soon as he could. Giving her other jägers to focus on seemed like the only way he’d have a chance of escaping her attention himself.

There was food left once they got to the square; a lot, in fact, since apparently there had been some confusion and three jägers had all gone out hunting that morning, and all of them had caught at least one deer. (Or maybe someone had just been really hungry. Whatever its origin, the extra food was good to have.) Even Lyubo didn’t go for it immediately, though; the new jägers crowded around Miss Agatha, who beamed at them without a hint of fear, passing out flowers and introducing herself to every jäger in turn.

(It was such a contrast to the nervous awkwardness Master Bill had never really gotten over and Master Barry’s open distaste that Maxim almost wanted to cry. He didn’t, though, if only so that he wouldn’t have to explain and no one else would be reminded.)

Most of the new jägers still hovered by Miss Agatha once they were introduced, staring at either her or each others’ flowers with a varying mix of desperate hunger and reverential awe. A few drifted over to get food, and then came right back to continue staring as they ate. The rest were supplied by a few of the town jägers who took it upon themselves to go collect food for their brothers and bring it over. Even Elena hovered in the group with the jägers, watching with a soft smile as Miss Agatha happily introduced herself to Dragos.

Dragos was at least twice Miss Agatha’s height and made entirely of black spikes. Even Maxim thought he was kind of intimidating to look at. Miss Agatha grinned at him, flowers held tightly in one hand as she pointed at herself with the other. “Hy em Agatha!”

It was practically a ritual at this point. Dragos knelt down to Miss Agatha’s eye level, pointing at himself solemnly. “Hy am Dragomir.”

Miss Agatha beamed like he was the first to answer her, and held the flowers up, frowning in concentration as she looked between them and him.

(Maxim had taught her that! He’d taught her that some colors went together better than others and she could match flowers by comparing them to the jäger she wanted to give one to. He’d still wound up with a yellow-and-white flower crown today, but it was progress. Besides, yellow matched Miss Agatha’s hair. He couldn’t object to yellow.)

Miss Agatha settled on a stem of large, bell-shaped blue flowers, and held them out to Dragos. “Iz hyu fl’wer,” she said, as seriously as if she were giving him a hat.

“Tenk hyu, Miz Agatha,” Dragos said, equally serious. He accepted the flower, and after a second tucked it into a button hole in his uniform.

Miss Agatha moved on to Elena next, and after introducing herself, stared at Elena curiously. “Hyu look fonny,” she said.

Elena’s eyebrows rose. “I’m not a jäger. I look human.”

Agatha’s eyebrows knitted together. “Human?”

“You and I are both human,” Elena said.

“Ho.” Agatha considered that quite seriously for a minute. “Iz Poppa Jenka human?”

Elena looked up, looked around, found Maxim, and stared. He had no idea how the stare was intimidating, but found himself hunching his shoulders defensively anyway. “Iz _not_ mine fault. She tinks mamma iz de vuns dot haff fur und poppa iz de rest ov os, hy dunno vhy.”

Elena sighed quietly and looked back at Agatha, who was watching her with obvious patience. “No, Jenka is a jäger.”

“Hokay,” Agatha said. That apparently satisfied her, and she began contemplating what flower to give to Elena.

Agatha had to collect more flowers to have enough for everyone, as it turned out, but the newest jägers were happy enough to follow her to the nearest field, so that was alright. And Elena ordered Dimo to bed within a minute of seeing him, so Maxim didn’t even have to say anything about that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oggie has been trying really hard to be a responsible dad! Only, he is now trying to singlehandedly parent a tiny Heterodyne he still feels compelled to obey _and_ about thirty+ of his brothers, all of whom are giant children and many of whom technically outrank him. Also, Oggie is even more of a giant child than most of them, so half the time "Miz Agatha do not play vit hyu food, food iz for eatink--MAXIM DO NOT TEACH HER TO PLAY VIT HER FOOD, IZ NOT A VEAPON" just turns into Oggie playing with his food. He _tried_!
> 
> My personal headcanon--which may, but likely will not ever come up in the fic itself--is that the girls who work for Mamma Gkika are all distant, sparkless Heterodyne descendants. This is important because while basically any Mechanicsburger could be (and indeed, are) trusted with the secret of the jäger bar/hospital Gkika runs (and most would be brave enough to enter it, if they had a reason to), the girls also assist Mamma Gkika with injured jägers when there are too many that need care at once, or when Gkika needs to sleep/take a break before she beats one of her idiot boys worse than they already are. (To be fair, most Mechanicsburgers _could_ be trusted with jäger physiology too, but it's the principle of the thing. Jägers prefer loopholes.) So, since Gkika can't leave herself to help guard the Heterodyne (which she is _not_ happy about), she sent Elena to both keep the jägers from doing anything too stupid, and fix them up or send them back to Gkika when they inevitably do it anyway. Not sure how big a role she'll have, but _someone_ other than Oggie, (sleep deprived) Dimo and (bored and therefore troublemaking) Jenka needed to be around to enforce a bit of sense on things.


End file.
